


Sentry Removal

by wanderingaesthetic



Category: Fullmetal Alchemist - All Media Types, Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood & Manga
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, Gen, War
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-04
Updated: 2015-10-04
Packaged: 2018-04-24 17:14:26
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 788
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4928230
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wanderingaesthetic/pseuds/wanderingaesthetic
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He really shouldn’t be surprised the first time he throws and the knife lands between red eyes. But he is.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Sentry Removal

Maes Hughes keeps six knives in the back of his belt. One-two-three-four-five-six, one to put between each knuckle of each hand, but he only does that when he’s making a threat, because you only need one blade to slit a man’s throat.

When Maes was eleven years old a circus came through town. There were clowns, and there was bear that rode a unicycle and there was a young woman who threw knives.

_Thunk._ A knife quivered in the wood next to her clown assistant’s ear. _Thunk._ Another one between his legs. _Thunk. Thunk. Thunk. Thunk._ The clown tried to run away from his partner and _rrrrrip_ , his baggy silk shirt got left behind, pinned with knives. The crowd laughed and cheered.

Maes spent his summer trying to emulate the trick. _Whoosh._ The knife went wide. _Crash._ It skittered through the canopy and into the woods, scaring squirrels. _Thunk._ It finally hit until _thunk. Thunk. Thunk._ It hit every time.

Maes did well in the academy, but when Maes was stationed in Ishval he wasn’t placed based on anything he learned there. No. It was because of the knives, because he had made a spectacle of himself, throwing at target paper while stone drunk with his tie around his head, his fellow cadets shouting bets. Fwip. Fwip. Fwip. _Heart, Adam’s apple, right between the eyes._

The commandant clapped him on the shoulder at breakfast. “Heard you can do quite the trick, Cadet Hughes,” he said so only Maes could hear.

So he really shouldn’t be surprised the first time he throws and the knife lands between red eyes. But he is.

The knives aren’t his mother’s steak knives, and they’re not the flashy little daggers he carried at the academy. They’re military issue, but not _standard_ military issue. The blade is sharp enough and strong enough to cut bone and they’re painted matte black so they won’t reflect moonlight.

He’s learned to be very quiet. He’s learned to clamp his left hand over the enemy’s mouth while he pulls the knife through his throat, so that he too will be very quiet. He’s learned to pull back quickly so he is not covered in the arterial spray, because the first time he didn’t and his right uniform sleeve was covered in blood. He reeked of iron and drew flies for two weeks, because water was too precious to waste on laundry. He has learned to let the man fall against him as he dies. He has learned to lower him gently to the ground.

He says that the knives are too sharp for them to feel anything before it is too late. That sounds right, but he doesn’t know. He thinks of a time when he broke a glass, washing dishes after Gracia had made him dinner. He smelled iron before he realized he had been cut. They don’t feel anything, or at least they don’t feel _much._ That seems right. He doesn’t know.

_Sentry removal._ That’s what they called it. Sneak, pounce, slice, repeat.

He is given the commendation that gets him promoted to captain after an Ishvalan soldier literally stumbles into the abandoned building where he and eight other members of his unit are camped. The Ishvalan is neither expecting nor looking for them, and there is a long moment where ten sets of eyes widen, ten mouths fall open. The soldier beside Maes drops the ration pack he was opening and reaches for his rifle, but Maes quite calmly puts one hand on his arm while he reaches for a knife with his other. The knife lands in the Ishvalan’s throat, and his death is long and messy, but the threat was eliminated without giving away their position. Afterwards, Maes rolls the dead man’s eyelids closed with two fingers. He looks about sixteen. Some of his fellow soldiers are about that age. At least it isn’t any of them.

Right?

Very often, he thinks about a game of capture the flag he played when he was a child. He remembers standing in a creek bed at midnight, defending his team’s flag, his trousers soaked to the knees, shivering and wanting nothing so much as to go home and go to bed.

He doesn’t remember whether or not his team won the game.

He might dream of Gracia’s arms, but the truth is that he falls asleep in a wheel rut beneath a troop transport truck and the stiff sheets of his academy bunk are the closest thing to heaven he can dream up. He sleeps, not easily, but black and dreamless, like he has been hit over the head with a hammer. He wakes up to gunfire, and what he feels isn’t fear but weariness _._


End file.
